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Oct. 29th, 2017 10:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rulingrowe[He doesn't regret it.
Concrete climbs up over his neck, his ears, his eyes. It freezes his arm extended up toward Delsin, blocks out the whistle of the wind as he falls, so all he hears is his heartbeat pounding and his ragged breath and still, in those split seconds as he falls, as he turns and vertigo and darkness and his crushing mortality flip his stomach, still Reggie can't regret it.
He's going to die...but Delsin'll make it out.
Reggie hits the water and the water hits back.
Reggie wakes up like clawing his way out of quicksand. His first breath is gasping, but when he expects to choke on water or rock there's nothing. He's in a bed, he's clean and not cuffed to anything, which doesn't seem right at all.]
I rescued you.
[A conduit- a kid, couldn't be more than thirteen, hugging his knees as he stares at Reggie from across the room with sunken eyes. The walls are cracked and peeling, and the bed he's on is just a mattress on the floor. Reggie yanks the blankets aside.
No concrete.]
...what happened?
[What happened is that Delsin did it. The D.U.P. has since been disbanded, the military moving in to clean up their mess. The Coast Guard arrived first and while people had wondered if it would just be a repeat of seven years ago, of massacres and manhunts, it didn't turn out that way. Maybe because of Delsin, because of the others, but the military worked with them to bring Augustine in and release the prisoners from Curdun Cay.
The boy tells him this with mistrustful eyes, squeezed back into a corner of the room. Now that Reggie looks at him he can see he's drenched, puddles of water pooling around him, constantly dripping. The fishy smell from the room must be coming from him.]
You're a Conduit, [Reggie breathes, Delsin's exasperated voice muttering, thank you, even as he tries to catch up.] ...you did save me. I owe you.
[The boy is a runaway, scared of being rounded up and even more afraid of his own parents. Horror stories about kids being turned in by their own families aren't anything new, though Reggie usually heard them in reference to murders and assaults, first. Parents who didn't know how to help their children, trying to find a solution to keep themselves and their families safe.
This run down shithole of an apartment the kid's squatting in doesn't look safe.
Before Reggie leaves he gives the kid a soggy business card from his equally damp wallet. The lettering is still legible at least.] Call the police office in Salmon Bay. Leave a message for me; they'll be sure to get it to me. You can't live like this, but I get that you're scared; I'll make sure Delsin hears about you, so you can get somewhere safe.
[The boy looks down at the card, face unreadable.]
Call me. Sheriff Rowe, Salmon Bay. All right, kid?
...my name's Alex.
Alex, then.
[His phone's a lost cause, and all calls going to Delsin's phone hit a disconnected wall. Must be past the bill date; Reggie usually pays it, after all.
Once he convinces the local precinct that he is, in fact, alive, Reggie gets a boat to head across the bay. With the bridge out his only option is to follow the channels as close back to Salmon Bay as he can get, get in touch with Betty and see if Delsin's there. God, he hopes he didn't go to far; he'd seen the reports, the footage, even heard first-person accounts from Conduits holed up in the precinct of Delsin saving them and while his heart had burst with pride, it had twisted with just as much worry.
Shit, if he watched Augustine kill Delsin in front of him, he'd be a goddamn disaster.
Once across the bay he rents a car, makes a beeline for Salmon Bay and the longhouse near the cannery. He's about to rush in, to check on the tribe (but Delsin must've helped them already, he knows his little brother, knows that his first stop would've been Betty and the others) when the billboard above the cannery catches his eye.]
Ah, shit...Delsin...
[It's good, too.
It's great work. Delsin is talented, after all.]
Concrete climbs up over his neck, his ears, his eyes. It freezes his arm extended up toward Delsin, blocks out the whistle of the wind as he falls, so all he hears is his heartbeat pounding and his ragged breath and still, in those split seconds as he falls, as he turns and vertigo and darkness and his crushing mortality flip his stomach, still Reggie can't regret it.
He's going to die...but Delsin'll make it out.
Reggie hits the water and the water hits back.
Reggie wakes up like clawing his way out of quicksand. His first breath is gasping, but when he expects to choke on water or rock there's nothing. He's in a bed, he's clean and not cuffed to anything, which doesn't seem right at all.]
I rescued you.
[A conduit- a kid, couldn't be more than thirteen, hugging his knees as he stares at Reggie from across the room with sunken eyes. The walls are cracked and peeling, and the bed he's on is just a mattress on the floor. Reggie yanks the blankets aside.
No concrete.]
...what happened?
[What happened is that Delsin did it. The D.U.P. has since been disbanded, the military moving in to clean up their mess. The Coast Guard arrived first and while people had wondered if it would just be a repeat of seven years ago, of massacres and manhunts, it didn't turn out that way. Maybe because of Delsin, because of the others, but the military worked with them to bring Augustine in and release the prisoners from Curdun Cay.
The boy tells him this with mistrustful eyes, squeezed back into a corner of the room. Now that Reggie looks at him he can see he's drenched, puddles of water pooling around him, constantly dripping. The fishy smell from the room must be coming from him.]
You're a Conduit, [Reggie breathes, Delsin's exasperated voice muttering, thank you, even as he tries to catch up.] ...you did save me. I owe you.
[The boy is a runaway, scared of being rounded up and even more afraid of his own parents. Horror stories about kids being turned in by their own families aren't anything new, though Reggie usually heard them in reference to murders and assaults, first. Parents who didn't know how to help their children, trying to find a solution to keep themselves and their families safe.
This run down shithole of an apartment the kid's squatting in doesn't look safe.
Before Reggie leaves he gives the kid a soggy business card from his equally damp wallet. The lettering is still legible at least.] Call the police office in Salmon Bay. Leave a message for me; they'll be sure to get it to me. You can't live like this, but I get that you're scared; I'll make sure Delsin hears about you, so you can get somewhere safe.
[The boy looks down at the card, face unreadable.]
Call me. Sheriff Rowe, Salmon Bay. All right, kid?
...my name's Alex.
Alex, then.
[His phone's a lost cause, and all calls going to Delsin's phone hit a disconnected wall. Must be past the bill date; Reggie usually pays it, after all.
Once he convinces the local precinct that he is, in fact, alive, Reggie gets a boat to head across the bay. With the bridge out his only option is to follow the channels as close back to Salmon Bay as he can get, get in touch with Betty and see if Delsin's there. God, he hopes he didn't go to far; he'd seen the reports, the footage, even heard first-person accounts from Conduits holed up in the precinct of Delsin saving them and while his heart had burst with pride, it had twisted with just as much worry.
Shit, if he watched Augustine kill Delsin in front of him, he'd be a goddamn disaster.
Once across the bay he rents a car, makes a beeline for Salmon Bay and the longhouse near the cannery. He's about to rush in, to check on the tribe (but Delsin must've helped them already, he knows his little brother, knows that his first stop would've been Betty and the others) when the billboard above the cannery catches his eye.]
Ah, shit...Delsin...
[It's good, too.
It's great work. Delsin is talented, after all.]
